


Totems

by baniszew



Category: Monument Valley (Video Game)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-18
Updated: 2015-12-18
Packaged: 2018-05-07 11:29:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5454956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baniszew/pseuds/baniszew
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A lesson on the history of the Valley.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Totems

**Author's Note:**

  * For [raininshadows](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raininshadows/gifts).



"Now class, try to imagine yourselves in the First Age."  

"Was there a Zeroth Age?"

"Presumably, Rodney.  But we know very little about even the First Age, only how it ended.  And so the Zeroth Age is all the unknown ages that were never recorded, all put together."

"So are we imagining that we're humans or that we're birds?"

"Good question, Vahana.  For now, let us say that those of you over here are humans, and those of you over here are birds."

"Can I be Ida?"

"Very well, Devan.  But here we come to our first important question - was the whole thing Ida's idea?  Or was she just the only one left to take the blame?"

 

* * *

 

Up, down, north, south, left, right, the flock spiraled and banked and dove.  From the walls and towers of the Valley, people watched.  They built the towers taller and taller to bring their view closer to the aerial dance.  In time, the buildings themselves let go of the earth to draw nearer the fliers.  The people were no longer below the birds -- they were above, below, beside.  But always they stood, or they sat.  They were bound not to the earth, but still to their towers.

Back, forth, in, out, together, apart, the birds flew.  They looked down upon the people.  Then they looked over at them, up to them.  The people moved casually and breathed easily.  For them, rest was always at hand. The flock had been on the wing for days, and they longed for rest.  

The king and queen of the birds perched on the edge of a tower.  Below them (across from them?) their daughter, the princess Ida, drank from a cool stream leading to a waterfall. Other birds perched all along the stream, up and down the falls.  After a short time, the king and the queen stood up.

"We must go," said the queen.  "Back to the sky.  We've no time to lay about if we want to make our next roost in time."

Ida looked mournfully at the stream, longing to stay just a bit longer, to splash her wings and play in it.  Then out of the corner of her eye, she saw something strange - one of the tower pinnacles was walking toward them.  She blinked.  No, it wasn't a part of the tower - it was just a woman with a fancy hat.  The hat has clearly been designed by the same people who built the tops of the turrets.  Walking with the woman were an assortment of other people, with simpler hats.

"Hello there!" said the king of the birds.  "Pardon us for intruding on your tower.  But do not worry, we were just about to take our leave.  We will not trouble you."

"It is no trouble at all," said a stocky man who stood by the woman with the fancy hat.  He did not have a hat.  "In fact, we were hoping some of you might stay a little longer."

Ida fluttered her wings in delight at the prospect of a few days of real rest.  The queen and king of the birds approached the humans cautiously.  The queen of the birds glanced at the angle of the sun on the horizon and thought a moment.  "If we stay more than a few days, we will have to stay for several months.  By the end, we would not be welcome."  

"My dear," the king said, "let us not speak for these people as to whether we would be welcome.  Let us hear them."  He waved wingtip at the stocky man, motioning for him to continue.

"Ma'am, Sir, your Graces," began the man, "My people have always watched yours with awe.  We have built towers  so tall they no longer touch the ground in order to be near your dances, to see you fly.  Flight is a joy we long for, but which we do not possess."

"And yet," said a human woman beside him -- this woman had no hat either -- "It has occurred to us that perhaps you long for something that we possess -- homes."  She gestured at the many splendid towers of the Valley.  Ida's eyes widened with longing as she glanced down the row of them, each more fantastic than the last.

"It has been a difficult decision for our people to make," said the man, glancing at the woman with the fancy hat.  She scowled at him grimly.  "But we would like to offer you a trade."  

The woman with no hat gestured to the woman with the fancy hat.  Slowly, she took her hat off her head and tipped it so that the birds could see inside.  Several shapes floated in midair, delicate and beautiful.  Each form was large enough to fill the hat on its own, yet somehow they were all there at the same time.

"These," said the woman holding her hat, "Are our Sacred Geometry.  It is through these sacred implements that we manipulate stone and metal as we do, to create our towers and monuments.  These are the sparks that empower us as creators."  Ida flew closer to peer into the hat.

"I'm not sure I understand," said the king of the birds.  "You want us to build you new buildings?"

"No," said the woman with no hat.  "We offer you the chance to make buildings for yourselves.  In return, we ask for the chance to fly."

The birds gasped collectively.  "You mean," said the queen of the birds, "You wish us to give up our flight, so that you may fly?"

"Only for a time," said the man with no hat.  "The Sacred Geometry will let you build quickly.  Keep it for a year.  Build yourselves places of refuge in any part of the world you wish.  During that time, we will fly.  In a year and a day, return it to us.  Then we shall return your power of flight."

"We must consult with our people," said the king of the birds. The birds withdrew to one corner of the tower to discuss the offer.  Ida flitted around among her friends, pointing to the stunning towers in the distance, wistfully describing the great houses they could build for themselves.  

The lives of birds run quickly, and so do their debates.  It did not take long for them to reach an agreement.  For one year they would trade with the humans, giving up the power of flight in exchange for the power to mold stone and metal to their will.

Ida approached the humans, standing between her parents.  The human woman held out her fancy hat toward them in one hand, and held the other open, palm up, waiting.  Ida and her parents reached to their heads and touched their crowns.  The air was filled with swirling rainbow colors.  The vortex of color shot into the crowns, which glowed white.  The three crowns merged as they came to rest together in the human woman's open palm.  All the humans drew in their breath.  The bird people had all turned black as crows.  

The human woman moved her fancy hat forward slightly, gesturing for one of the birds to take it.  The birds looked at each other and squawked curiously.  At last, the one in the center leaned forward and grabbed the fancy hat in its beak.  The intricate forms inside tumbled out and swirled around the bird, bathing it in blinding white light.  When the light faded, there stood a girl with black hair, a white dress, and a white pointed hat.  She looked around her at the crow people, and then she looked up to see scores of humans take flight.  Their dance was beautiful.  When she finally looked away, she saw that the crow people had scattered, wandering the towers aimlessly.  A glowing figure with a strange hat that resembled some of the tower pinnacles walked away in the distance.  

The girl looked down at her hands.  They were empty, but she could feel energy coursing through them.  She did not know who she was, but she knew what she had to do and where she had to go.  She had to build.

 

* * *

 

"So class, who knows how long Ida worked building?"

"A year," said Devan. "That's what we promised."

"Yeah, but we got all mixed up," said Vahana. "Ida was used to being a bird where a year feels like a really long time.  But the Sacred Geometry made her feel like a human.  So she built lots and lots of buildings, and she kept building until she felt like a long time had passed."

"And the human queen got mixed up, too!" said Rodney.  "She was used to being a human where a year feels like a long time, but it doesn't feel like forever.  So after a few weeks, she goes to the top of the tower expecting Ida to come back.  But Ida doesn't come.  So she gets mad.  Really mad." 

"Very good," said the teacher.  "And what were the crow people doing?"

"It didn't feel like very long to them," said Rodney, walking back and forth in a line and squawking.  "They had a nice rest.  And they ate all the fruit in the humans' orchards."

"That's right. And what were the humans doing?"

"They were flying!" exclaimed Vahana.  

"Yes," said the teacher.  "But without the Sacred Geometry to connect them to their buildings, they lost their way.  They flew and flew, and they never found their way home.  They flew until they died."

 

* * *

 

The girl cocked her head to one side and studied the angle of the sun in the sky.  She had just completed her eighth building.  Something inside her told her that it was time to go back to the building she had been in before her first building.

She walked through a garden and along a path.  The building was utterly, still and lonely.  At the end, she took off her hat and tipped it near a strange pulsing tile.  A  cube tumbled out and floated above the tile, spinning gently.  The girl put her hat back on her head and held her hands to her temples for a second.  She had an odd feeling she couldn't quite place.

She kept moving.  The ghostly glowing woman with the strange hat -- she was so angry.  Why was she angry? 

The girl knelt to touch the structure beneath her feet.  Something had come back to her when she'd poured the cube out of her hat.  She had given something to the building, and it had given something back.

She went higher.  She tipped her hat again, and out tumbled a cube within a cube.  A memory flickered across her mind.  A trade.  She was supposed to bring these things back to someone.  Why was no one here to greet her?  Why was no one here but an angry ghost?

Ida climbed.  Yes, that was her name.  Ida.  

Ida saw a crow sitting on a ledge, idly dangling its feet over a lily pond.  Was she supposed to give something back to the crow?  She was not sure.  The crows did not seem to care about the glowing forms that poured out of her hat, although some seemed to squawk questioningly at the hat itself.  The aimless crow people made Ida sad, just as the empty echoing hallways made her sad.  How was it that the crow people did not make the halls seem less empty?  

Ida tipped out the contents of her hat twice more, giving the energy shapes to the buildings themselves.  She walked into a deeply shadowed chamber with a dark, still lake.  As she strode forward, the water rippled.  Something moved.  Suddenly, part of the building rose up beneath her, shining with golden light.  Part of the building as awake, and it had come to help her. 

And so it was that the first Totem came to be.  Together, Ida and the Totem returned the rest of the Sacred Geometry to Monument Valley.  Ida gave back the power to shape earth and metal, and so too did she give Human Memory back to the Valley.  

With no humans left to receive it, the Monuments themselves took in the power and memory.  In return, Ida was reunited with her crown.  As she touched it, the whirlwind of color filled the air again, and the bird people were restored to themselves.  Once more they had color and flight.

Up, down, north, south, left, right, the flock spiraled and banked and dove.  From the walls and towers of the Valley, the Totems watched. Yet they did not long for flight themselves.  The Totems remembered the time of transition, when some but not all of the Sacred Geometry was restored, and when some but not all of the Gift of Birds remained within the Monuments.  They watched the birds and admired their beauty, but they knew what fleeting lives the birds possessed.  Some of them left the Valley, traveling to distant Shores, to guide the birds to shelter on their migrations and see that Ida's eight buildings were used.

And so Ida passed on, as the humans of the Valley before her.  And so it is that we offer our reverence and respect to her and to the humans.  Their sacrifices gave us life.  On this day we build reenactments of their tale.  We rest in the grandeur of the Monuments, and we ensure that none shall be forgotten.  We honor the human builders of the First Age, Ida's buildings of the Second Age, and our works of the Third Age.  Although we shall never fly, we shall hold that memory tight within us.  We shall give refuge to the lost, give solace to the repentant, and we shall help the dreamers soar.

 


End file.
